On Sunday 27th January I picked up Ashley, Simon and Andrea at their hotel to go to the stadium car park. Later, I met the other mates near the start line. Unfortunately, Gillian wasn’t going to take part at the race because she had broken some ribs a few days before the race. I met my friend Rafael who was going to do the 9 km race near the start line as well. In fact, it was his first competitive race. We all had some photos taken and wished each other good luck. At the start line, Antonio G. saw us and told me that he had slept very little because of a terrible cough. Before the race, when I did some warm-up, I felt some discomfort in my right calf, which made me think that I’d probably have to do the 9 km race even walking instead of running. Actually, I had felt some pain ten days before when I was training. It made me stop after 7 kilometres and I went to a physio the following day since I felt I wouldn’t be able to do the half marathon. In spite of this massage, when I went for a run the following day, I still felt discomfort. So, I decided to enter the 9 km race instead. However, on Wednesday and Thursday before the race I went to have a session with Indiba
http://www.indiba.com/index.php . This made my calf be much better, so I decided to do the half marathon instead. Nevertheless, when I started the race I thought that my calf wouldn’t manage to do the half marathon but I decided to go at a pace at which I felt comfortable with Antonio G., who hadn’t slept well for a few nights due to a terrible cough. I felt comfortable at the 6 minute pace that we did the first kilometres. However, after 8 or 9 kilometres we had to slow down but feeling OK. When we were going up La Rambla, a former student of mine, Javier, told us that we had to speed a little if we wanted to get to the finish line within the allowed time. However, I thought that if we kept that pace we could get there under 2 hours 30 minutes. Antonio decided to go a bit faster but I couldn’t keep his pace. At avenida del Mediterráneo, at km 16 more or less, I met a runner who was walking because he got injured but he changed to jogging with me for a few minutes. Then, at around kilometre 18 I met another runner who told me he came from Vera. He said that it was his first half marathon but he had never done more than ten kilometres training. In the last three kilometres, I had to walk and run because I felt very tired due to not having trained much lately. At last, I got to the stadium, a smaller one used for training, in 2 hours 25 minutes 41 seconds according to my watch. I was really happy to have managed to do my 12th consecutive half marathon in Almería. There, I met Antonio G., who had finished the half two minutes earlier than me and the Running commentary team who were waiting for me since they had finished much earlier. I picked up my T-shirt, tomatoes, water, Aquarius, newspaper, etc.
We had a good time at the restaurant where we enjoyed the meal and the company of the RC team and Antonio G, Manolo and Santi. Unfortunaltely, Manolo and Santi hadn’t taken part in the race because of injuries. Actually, Santi had to use crutches to walk.
On Monday evening, we went to have a few drinks and tapas at Lamarca and El Ajolí.
Unfortunately, Sweder had to leave on Monday morning. I hope her mum is better.
It was great to meet new friends from the UK, Andrea and Louise and meet the others who had come in previous years, Sweder, Julie, Cam, Gillian, Marian and Simon.
XVI Medio maratón de Almería 27th January 2013
